John Steinbeck, the iPhone and the Value of a Well-Rounded Life - February 27, 2007
Recently the Gainesville Sun had a story about a teenager who wrote a novel. Perhaps you saw it. Thirteen-year-old Nancy Yi Fan's book will be published by HarperCollins. With that kind of success at this young age, you have to believe Nancy has a remarkably promising future as a writer.
Well, that's how some people find their role in life. Others kind of move along, going from this to that, until they become...oh, I don't know, a university president. I earned my doctorate in dental surgery, which has nothing to do with running one of the nation's largest public universities, unless you count the pulling teeth and laughing gas parts.
But exactly how I got here is a story for another day. What I have learned in my life, and what I want to tell you in this speech, is pretty simple: It's good to try many things, and even better to succeed at them.
Let me pause here to say "congratulations" to today's Cum Laude Society inductees. Cum Laude's standards are high, and I know you worked hard. I also want to recognize your parents and families. And, I would like to applaud Oak Hall for hosting a Cum Laude chapter.
I like the Cum Laude Society because it rewards students for performing well in all academic subjects. This is also a great thing about high school. In high school, you are forced to cast your net wide. And that can mean pulling in unexpected treasure.
We often hear that success is all about becoming an expert. To be sure, some experts earn a lot of money. But in the big picture, being an expert, if that's all you are, is a bad idea for your career and life. By rewarding your talent in many different areas, the Cum Laude Society is giving you a better roadmap for success and happiness.
I understand that Oak Hall has a comprehensive program that includes art. I am told that most high school students here take at least two art classes.
Art. Why art?
Seniors, if you want to strike fear into your parents' hearts, tell them you want to major in art in college.
That may be how the parents of a guy named Chad Hurley reacted when he decided to major in fine arts at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. After graduating about a decade ago, Hurley made his way to California, where he got a job for a small Internet company. You may have heard of it – PayPal?
There, he tapped his fine arts background to design the PayPal logo, as well as the company's first T-shirts. Hurley stayed at PayPal for awhile, then started casting around for other work. After a party with a bunch of friends, he discovered it was impossible to share videos online. The files were too big and took too long to upload. So Hurley founded another little Internet company
...Oh, you may have heard of this one, too. It's called YouTube.
YouTube was bought by Google late last year for $1.65 billion. Hurley's share was reported to be more than $300 million, depending on the value of Google's stock. This year, Hurley, the fine arts major from the little known college, turns 30.
I am not saying that if you major in fine arts you will go on to start the next Internet phenomenon. And I am certainly not saying that you shouldn't pursue art for its own sake. What I am saying is that if you enjoy art, chances are it will be useful to you in ways you never anticipate. Even if you become a stock broker or a scientist.
Speaking of stock brokers...I gleaned some of the information about Hurley from the phenomenally popular and free online encyclopedia, Wikipedia. I bet your teachers tell you that's not a good idea because Wikipedia can be less than reliable. But that's ok for me because Oak Hall said I would pass today if all I got for this speech was a "C"!
Anyway, Wikipedia was founded by a fellow named Jimmy Wales, who you may know makes his home just down the road in St. Petersburg. Wales earned his bachelor's and master's degrees not in fine arts, but in finance. He got wealthy as an options trader in Chicago before starting Wikipedia. Wales loved numbers. But as a child, he also loved encyclopedias.
So let me walk you through this: A child who loves encyclopedias, which are about everything in the world, gets rich in the financial markets. Then he returns to his passion by pioneering a new way of exploring everything in the world. Could there be a better example of the power of being well-rounded?
Actually, there is.
There was another youngster who loved encyclopedias so much that when he was 8 years old, he read the World Book Encyclopedia all the way through the "Ps" That kid was Microsoft founder Bill Gates. Why he stopped at the "P" I'm not sure. A biography I read said that after "P," he got interested in other activities. Presumably that included "S," for software.
Now just so you don't think I am overly focused on the computer world, let me tell you about a few other successful people and their unlikely roadmaps.
Russell Simmons is the founder of the Phat Farm and Baby Phat clothing lines and co-founder of Def Jam music. Simmons majored in sociology at City College of New York. In his spare time, he pursued his passion promoting early hip-hop block parties and club shows. Not an academic thing, perhaps, but one that changed Simmons and our culture.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice earned her college degree in political science. But as a child, her parents pushed her to study French, music, figure skating, ballet and other subjects. She remains an accomplished pianist who performs in Washington D.C. with a chamber music group. I think her parents were onto something.
Body builder, turned Terminator, turned California Governor, turned anti-global warming advocate Arnold Schwarzenegger. Enough said.
OK, so are you starting to see a pattern here? The thread connecting this or that passion in a person's past to their future isn't always obvious. But it is there. Pursuing a wide range of interests is more than a means to an end. It's a style of life, a way to think about thinking. It opens your mind and lets ideas in, and that's what really matters.
As John Steinbeck wrote, "Ideas are like rabbits. You get a couple and learn how to handle them, and pretty soon you have a dozen."
I want to close with one final quick story from the computer world.
Most of you know Steve Jobs as the CEO of Apple Computer, the company behind the iPod and the iPhone. But I am old enough to remember Steve Jobs, the creative genius behind the first Apple Macintosh, which was pretty much the computer that changed everything. Before the Mac appeared, computers were strange, unwieldy, unapproachable things. You really didn't want to get too close to one. After the Mac, we couldn't get close enough.
Anyway, Steve Jobs gave the commencement address at Stanford a couple of years ago. He told the story of how, while a young man, he took a class in calligraphy at Reed College. He didn't have a plan, and taking that class made no sense. But he liked the way calligraphy looked, and he enjoyed learning about this fine and delicate art.
A decade later, when Jobs was designing the Mac, it occurred to him that computers didn't have to rely on ugly uniform type – type that screamed "I am on a computer!" In fact, computers could have beautiful fonts and gorgeous type.
The Mac embodied that decision. It wasn't just an ugly clunky box unpleasant to lay your hands on. It was nice-looking and fun and attractive to use. It was an artful machine or, if you like, just plain art. Apple's products still have that reputation today.
To you, Cum Laude Society inductees, and to all the students here, I say keep you minds and your options open. Try many new things, even if they don't seem to have a point. If you do, and I know you will, it will lead to your own YouVisions and iSuccesses.
Thank you.
Bernie Machen